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10 years for suspect in Madrid bombings

November 07, 2006|By Items compiled from Tribune news services.

MILAN, ITALY — An Egyptian who is one of the chief suspects in the 2004 Madrid train bombings was sentenced Monday to 10 years in prison.

A Milan court convicted Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed, 35, and co-defendant Yahia Ragheh, 23, of subversive association aimed at international terrorism, a charge introduced in Italy after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Ragheh was sentenced to 5 years.

Ahmed was accused of having ties with the terrorist cell that carried out the March 11, 2004, bombings on the Madrid commuter rail system that killed 191 people and of indoctrinating Ragheh as a suicide bomber.

Ahmed is to be tried with 28 others in Spain next year for the Madrid bombings.